Black Bear Rising: A BWWM Paranormal Romance (Black Bear Saga Book 1) (23 page)

Lana heard the men leave the room and then a nurse touched her gently on her shoulder and helped her to strip. Her clothes scratched painfully against her skin as she peeled them off like a clinging second skin. She dried herself with a soft towel and then the nurse helped her into a pair of light cotton pyjamas and helped her into the bed.

“I’ll take your clothes and dry them off,” said the nurse as she left the room.

The doctor and Einar returned and without asking Einar took Lana's hand again. The skin on the back of her neck prickled at his touch and she gave his warm strong hand a squeeze. The doctor and Einar spoke and then he translated it for her. “The nurse is going to wash out your eyes with a sterile solution and then the doc will check them.” After Lana's eyes were cleaned of any remaining pieces of grit the Doctor gently opened her eyelids with thumb and forefinger and shone a thin beam of light into them. Lana could see cream coloured blobs dance back and forth in her vision and pulsating areas of black near the corners.

“Am I blind?” she asked and she could hear the rising fear in her voice.

Einar squeezed her hand and then translated again. “The doc says you are going to be ok. The sand scratched your corneas and did some damage. He says your sight is going to be blurry for a week or so. He is going to bandage your eyes and the dressing will be changed every morning. The quickest way to recovery is to rest them.”

“So I’m not blind am I? You would tell me the truth if thats what the doctor said. I can handle the truth.”

Einar took her hand in both of his and gently rubbed it and said, “I would never lie to you. I can see you’re a strong person. I’m telling the truth, a week of rest and the doc says you will be back to normal. Look I know you have just been through hell and it must be scary being in a foreign country but I will help you as much as you want.”

“Will you stay with me for a while, once the doctor is finished?”

“I will. I need to go out and check on my horse. There is a field beside the clinic I can let him roam in. Will you be ok on your own for a few minutes?”

Lana nodded and he let go of her hand and left the room. She felt powerless and alone sitting here in the room as the doctor began to apply protective covers on her eyes and then bandage them. I was seconds away from death she thought and then it hit her. It was like the tide going out and exposing the rotten beams of a small jetty, she was no longer in shock and what had just happened finally set in. It felt like the cold black sand was pressing in on her again. She could feel it under her fingernails, scratching inside her ears and slowly filling her mouth. Her chest tightened as the sand crushed her and she gripped the bed sheet in a steely grip.

“I can’t breath, I can’t,” She spluttered as it felt like her throat began to be filled with the course volcanic grit. She thrashed her head back and forth as her heart hammered in her chest, “Choking, the sand is choking me,” she shouted.

The Doctor yelled something and the nurse ran into the room with a syringe. Lana felt a sharp sting in her arm as the nurse withdrew the tip of the needle from her. A liquid warmth began to spread up her arms, her chest began to relax and her wracking breaths slowed down as it became easier to breathe. She lay down on the pillow and its softness seemed to beckon her down into its welcoming embrace.

“What did you give me?” She said slurring.

“A sedative, it will help you to relax. You were starting to have a panic attack which is understandable after what you have been through,” the nurse answered.

The doctor finished bandaging her eyes as Lana lay there on the precipice of sleep. Her limbs wouldn’t move as if they were magnetised to the bed. If she tried to raise them they immediately fell back down onto what felt like the softest bed cover she had ever touched. Her whole body hummed at an agreeable frequency and she couldn’t fully piece together where she was. She knew she had gone fishing with an old man, maybe she had fallen overboard was the best answer her woozy brain could throw up.

Einar came back and spoke to the doctor and nurse before they left him alone with Lana. The noise of a chair being dragged to her bedside sounded like a trumpet played down a long concrete pipe. He took her hand again and squeezed it and said, “The doc said you may drift off to sleep in a few minutes. I’ll wait here until you wake up.”

Lana had a dim recollection of who was talking, had he saved her from drowning she thought. She liked how his hand felt wrapped around her. It felt like she was melting into him and they were becoming one interconnected person. Could he hear her thoughts she wondered and then realised she had said it out loud.

Einar laughed and said, “I think thats the meds kicking in, you are a little loopy.”

It came back to Lana in a fragmented and broken flash, this man holding her hand had saved her life. She owed him her life. She spoke and her words come out slurred, “Can I kiss you, you’re my hero,” she said as she puckered her lips and then the sedative took hold and like a light going off she was unconscious.

Einar looked down at her as her breathing relaxed. “I’m no hero,” he said and got up and left her room in search of a cup of strong coffee.

Gus looked through the browser history on Lana's computer. “Look at this,” he said pointing to a line of text on the screen.

Brad knew next to nothing about computers. He relied on his brain and his brawn and the combination of both had gotten him this far, he wasn't going to start relying on some electronic device now. “Enlighten me, what does it mean?”

Gus sat cross legged on the couch beside Brad, his silk kimono was open and exposing more of his flesh than Brad was comfortable seeing. “Its Lana's search history. Its what she did on the computer the morning before she came to me with the supposedly only copy of the video. This shows that an hour before she met me she accessed a digital locker and uploaded a file named video0002. The bitch has a copy saved and she can access it any time and any where,” Gus said.

“Can’t you just delete it from her account.”

“Nah, the bitch was careful. Her account locked itself as soon as the file uploaded. I have a guy who can take a look, maybe she got careless and he can hack the account. It could take hours or days, who knows with these sort of things. We need to squash this thing before it snowballs out of control. Pick them up and bring them here. We can deal with them then. I was hoping not to have to lose such good earners. The black one especially, the clients loved her.”

“Are you sure you want me to bring them back here?” Brad asked.

“Ive grown bored of this place. I was thinking it was time to move on any way. Try not to hurt them, there will be plenty of time for that once they get here.”

Brad nodded and got up to go and then turned back to Gus. “I might have been seen at the dorm earlier today. I’m going to bring on two other trusted men to handle the snatch and grab. I’ve used them before, they are both pros.”

Gus nodded and said, “Use whoever you need to. Remember it comes from your cut. And Brad darling don't fuck up, you don't want your boss finding out about the existence of this video. You know how it will end if he does.” He blew a kiss in Brads direction as he turned his back and left.

Brad sat in his parked car and rubbed his temples. He could feel the slow tectonic plates shifting beneath him, slowly sliding over each other until out of nowhere they slammed together sending shockwaves reverberating outwards. He felt completely powerless and knew in his weary bones that a tsunami of shit was heading his way. He flipped open his phone and dialled. After two rings someone picked up on the other end. “I need some help on a job,” Brad said into the cell phone, “The usual. I need you and another trusted guy.” Brad nodded his head as the voice on the end of the phone spoke and then he continued, “It will probably be broad daylight. Yep you get extra for that and I need your help in less then two hours. Ok I can do that, I’ll pick you up there,” and he flipped the phone closed and ended the call. He gunned the engine and headed to the designated pickup spot.

The diner was dimly lit with a few fossilised patrons sucking down bowls of soup. Brad sat in a booth that gave him full view of everyone that came and went. The walls were the kind of brown that was never in fashion in any era and several pencil drawings of long dead celebrities from another country hung on the wall. The framed drawings were yellowed and sun damaged and the one closest to Brads booth had a long dead wasp trapped between the drawing and the glass front. An african american in his seventies with a limp filled Brads cup of coffee for the third time. Brad nodded and the old man reciprocated and shuffled away. This was the kind of place that Brad felt comfortable in, somewhere he could fade into the background and not be noticed. In his line of work the less attention he could draw to himself the better. He sipped at his black and oily coffee and took out his notebook. He held it tight in his hand like a sick man might grasp the bible. To Brad the thin scrawls contained in the pages were his salvation. Every time he got to cross another debt off the list and close another door to the hungry wolves he felt one step closer to the chosen land, a place were he could put this life behind him and truly start over. His sins would be washed away and he would be reborn. All he had to do was keep it together for the next six months to a year, continue to take out the trash and clean up after the men he worked for, then and only then could he grow a conscience.

He told himself that this wasn't the time for weakness, the notebook was becoming lighter in his pocket every time he scratched off one more debt, and yet he was beginning to doubt himself and the things he had done. He had no other options, curl up in a self pitying ball on a dirty mattress in some flop house and pretty soon those snarling and rabid wolves would catch up with him and rip out his throat in a spray of red. No one would mourn for him, there would be no funeral with a doting and heart broken wife being held on unsteady legs by a caring family member. The most likely end for Brad if he quit too soon would be his brain blown out by a gun with the serial number filed off and the trigger pulled by someone who would disappear like a ghost. No one would mourn Brad, he knew this. What really burned in his gut like a broken bottle jammed into him and twisted, what really hurt him was he knew his daughter would be relieved that he was gone. She could finally relax knowing that he would never turn up on her doorstep again making promises he would never keep and repeating the same lies she had heard a hundred times before. He thumbed the pages of the notebook and thought to himself, soon I will be free.
 

The door to the diner opened and two men entered. A cursory glance would tell you that they were both either brothers or closely related. The older brother Serkin had a grey streak running from front to back in his always slicked back hair. His younger brother was called Roman and he usually said very little. They were both short and squat with ruddy cheeks that gave them the look of two angry chipmunks. Thin noses and even thinner lips that never smiled made most people glance quickly away from these two men. They wore cheap track suit bottoms, bright white trainers and heavy black leather jackets that looked like they had been dragged behind a truck for several miles. They spotted Brad and nodded in his direction. Brad could see them subtly checking out every angle in the diner, where the exits were situated, how many customers were in the place, what the staff were doing and a hundred little things that someone who was in this business long enough observed any time a meet up was called.

The two men sat across the table from Brad and they both nodded to him in unison. The older brother spoke, he was usually the only one who did when Brad had any dealings with them.

“Whats the job?” Serkin asked. Brad could never place the accent, to him all eastern europeans sounded the same. All he knew was they always sounded serious and ready to get down to business straight away.

“Snatch and grab. Two college aged girls. My boss wants to speak to them as soon as possible. I left all the info in our usual drop off spot. We need this done as soon as possible,” Brad said.

“Ok we can do that,” Serkin said.

“Look when I say we need them straight away, my boss wants them already gift wrapped and waiting in his office. Don’t wait until night time to grab them, if you see them act on it straight away,” Brad said.

“You know it’s extra for this kind of work during the day, more people, more variables, more chance to be seen,” Serkin replied.

“I’ve taken that into account. There is a twenty percent bonus if you get them by this afternoon. If you don’t have them by eight tonight I have someone else to take up the job,” Brad lied.

Serkin turned to his brother and they spoke to each other in another language. To brad they both sounded angry, always angry and Roman nodded his head a few times until Serkin banged his fist on the table ending the conversation. He turned back to speak to Brad.

“This is all very exceptional. Without time to prepare we think a forty percent bonus should be fair. Otherwise we cant do the job on such a short time scale,” Serkin said.

Brad had worked with them enough times to know that they had already decided on doing the job just by agreeing to the meeting, these where not guys who messed around when it came to work. The one thing he could always expect from them was some haggling over price. They couldn't help themselves and he was always ready for it.

“Deal. My contact details are in the package, call when the job is done. Nice doing business with you as usual Serkin,” Brad said offering him his hand. Serkin shook it followed by Roman and the two left. Now came the worst part, the waiting. His guts churned and that old familiar pain began again behind his eyes. He knew what he had just set in motion and it was not going to end well for those two girls. Think of the notebook and the list he told himself, this will all be soon behind you. It felt like offering a man in a desert a thimble full of water. The pain increased and he winced, he continued thumbing the pages of his notebook like it was a religious icon and his one true path to, if not forgiveness, then maybe freedom.